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Sunday, 27 September 2015

23andMe.com

I recently got the results of my DNA analysis and there were a few surprises. Turns out I am only 39.4% British (which includes Scotland, Ireland and Wales). The rest of me is European and northern European for the most part. I would have expected to be at least half British but no I'm an import!

Larry on the other hand, my American husband, is more British than I am! He is 50% British and the rest is a real mixture from all over the world.

Ancestry Composition tells you what percent of your DNA comes from each of 31 populations worldwide. This analysis includes DNA you received from all of your recent ancestors, on both sides of your family. The results reflect where your ancestors lived before the widespread migrations of the past few hundred years.

On the site we get a lovely coloured picture showing all the regions of the world where our dna is linked but I was unable to copy that here.

It appears that if one is female, then only the maternal line is available to see because a female has two X chromosones and a Y is needed for the paternal line to show up. I could get that from a direct member of my family like a brother, if I had one. The only direct male relative I have with a direct line to my paternal grandfather is a cousin. I tried to reach him today to ask him if he would do the test and share the results but he was out so I'll have to try again another day soon. He may not be willing to do the test. It's not a blood test, merely a sample of saliva given over for analysis. It's easy to do and fairly expensive but well worth the money for the results that come back - everything from ancestry composition to health reviews.

My health reviews were favourable but I discovered that I am a carrier for Hemachromatosis, which causes the blood to retain too much iron with unwelcome results. The iron can attack vital organs like the liver, heart etc. I do not suffer from this myself, as far as I know, but I will need to tell my sons in case it crops up in their lifetimes. Apparently being a carrier is something quite common.

I also discovered that I am part of the X2b4 haplogroup on my maternal side. This is a rare, small group but very widespread, popping up all over the world but with particularly high occurrences in the Orkney Islands of Scotland, in some Native American Indians and particularly in the Druzes community in the middle east. They predominate in Syria, Jordan, Israel and the Lebanon, which is probably why I have slightly Arab type features with darkish skin and hair (grey now of course). There is a group to belong to on the site where I looked at people who look a bit like me. Interesting.

3 comments:

This is such a whole new world of discovery for all of us. DNA for people and animals. Our heritage does explain a lot of things about us , doesn't it ? I am not sure I want to know too much more about my heritage, I've already had some big discoveries regarding my family lines that took some time to get used to.:)

We have a friend who took the DNA test and was surprised to discover he was mostly of Jewish ancestry, and he didn't have a clue until he got the results !

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